Passive House

You are cordially invited to the first Passive House Minnesotameeting.

We are looking to found a local organization to support and promote the Passive House building energy standard. We are looking for planners, designers, engineers, builders, vendors, suppliers, educators, lobbyists, building geeks, and energy conservationists—basically professionals who would like to support and promote the Passive House building energy standard. Join us at the meeting and become a member of a strong lobby for a strong concept.

We’ll be meeting in suite 512 (AIA conference suite) at International Market Square in Minneapolis. (NOT in the AIA office)
AGENDA

11.30 General introduction to the Passive House building energy standard (attendance optional)

12:00 Break (Damicos is located in the courtyard of IMS)

12.15 Welcome, general introductions, and introduction of the Passive House Alliance (PHA)

Repost of an article by Martin Holladay about his visit at the 4th North American Passive House Conference this past weekend in Urbana, IL: “Clearing away misconceptions will improve the dialogue between Passivhaus advocates and American builders”

A number of people recommended John Straube’s article on buildingscience.com to me. I appreciate that PH is being discussed on buildingscience.com and John’s in-depth assessment of PH in cold climate settings.

I thought I’d offer some perspective from my corner of the world (Minneapolis, MN = cold climate). Read more →

Thanks for attending my lecture at the Green by Design conference. It was a fabulous event and many great ideas were shared. In the spirit of the conference I am offering my slideshow for review at slideshare: http://www.slideshare.net/timeian

Since most of my slideshows don’t have a lot of text or bullet points, you may want to look at the Living Green Expo slideshow, which was designed to run without my presentation and offers lots of frequently asked questions and answers.

In my spare time 😉 I’ve been working on a design for an urban Passive House. The design is meant to fit a standard size east-west facing lot. The floorplan offers a first-floor bedroom and bath, as well as an open kitchen, living, and dining area. The second floor offers a flexible layout that can be configured to hold up to 3 bed rooms, 1 bath, and a common room. This urban Passive House works either with or without a basement. Depending on the configuration, it offers between 1,675 and 2,475 usable square feet.

The roof is designed to hold solar-thermal panels that face due south at a 55 degree angle. It also offers plenty of south-facing real estate for PV panels. Ultimately, this Passive House is designed to become a net-energy positive building, e.g. it makes more energy than it consumes and pays its inhabitants by selling excess energy to the grid.

The garage building mimics the main building’s roofline. The main body of the house would be stucco, the gable-ends lap-siding. The roofing is standing-seam metal. The trellis on the south-facade shades the windows below in the summer months. It offers the potential to grow vines on it. Additional solar panels could be located on top of the trellis if so desired.

I think this has been up for a while as it was recorded almost a year ago. I was just alerted to it by a potential client.
Thanks to Bill Karges for inviting me into his house and to talk about Passive House building energy standard.

Thanks to all that visited the TE Studio booth at the Living Green Expo! We had a great time and enjoyed talking with all of you about Passive House and Deep Energy Reduction Retrofit. We look forward to working with some of you to maximize your investment and minimize its impact on the environment.

The first Twin Cities Passive House Interest Group Meeting will be held on Saturday, February 21, 2009 from 10 AM to Noon at the Red Stag Supperclub at 509 1st Avenue NE, Minneapolis, MN 55413. Please RSVP by 2/14/2009 to info@testudio.com